Lawmaker Proposes Ban On Publicly-Funded Non-Disclosure Agreements

A lawmaker wants to stop companies and organizations from using taxpayer money to fund non-disclosure agreements. The issue came up recently with the now-closed online charter school, ECOT, which required severance packages to include these agreements.

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Records show that the Electronic Classroom of Tomorrow spent more than half a million dollars on severance packages with non-disclosure agreements attached.

ECOT has been accused of fabricating student attendance data in order to get millions of state dollars.

Democratic Representative Kristin Boggs says NDAs are just another example of wasting public funds.

“There’s no reason why we should be spending a half a million dollars on to hush employees about bad and wrongful practices of an organization that has been publicly funded for so many years," says Boggs.

Her bill would stop groups from attaching these agreements to publicly-funded severance packages, and give the state the power to go after that money in the future if they do.

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The Ohio Supreme Court has likely dealt the final blow to what was the state’s largest online charter school, ruling the state could base funding for the Electronic Classroom of Tomorrow on student participation, not enrollment.

The Ohio Attorney General has filed an argument in court claiming ECOT’s agreements with its management and software service companies constitute a pattern of corrupt activity. The claim echoes complaints Democratic lawmakers have lodged for years.

Longtime critics of the Electronic Classroom of Tomorrow, the now-closed but still controversial online charter school, say that more employees would come forward with accusations of student data manipulation had they not signed contracts with non-disclosure agreements attached.